Block D, two months into my clinical year of veterinary school and I am now on a newly offered elective – Equine Farrier Science. This is the first year that this elective has been offered during the clinical year, as opposed to a one-week block that is offered to fourth year students during professional development. Professional development is a period of about a month and a half before graduation in which fourth years can take rotations that are more pertinent to what they will be practicing following graduation.

I spent two weeks with one of the farriers and his apprentice, and I learned a lot during these two weeks. Before my clinical year, I can only remember learning about equine feet during one two-hour lecture that was offered in an elective course. We also learned some of the basic information about feet during first year in anatomy, but that has been about all that we have been allotted for this subject.

Because this rotation is so new, it was pretty small; just one other student and I. Thankfully, we got along very well because that could have made for an awkward two weeks if we didn’t! I learned that this is not a very intuitive subject for me, because there were multiple occasions where I was asked a question and I answered and gave my reason for the answer and it was the complete opposite of what I had initially thought. During this rotation, I learned how to dress (rasp) the feet and learned that if this is done well, it makes the trimming process that much easier. I also learned how to pull shoes. Although we didn’t have that many chances for hands-on practice, I learned to look at horses and their conformation and movement in a new way and in a way that I believe will help me throughout my career, especially because sports medicine and lameness is something that I find very interesting at this point.

I plan on trying to shadow the farriers more in the coming months during weekends when I’m not on call for other services because I can learn a lot from them and I have realized that I need to take advantage of their knowledge while I am still at school and they are easy to get in touch with.